Parents turn to melatonin amid spike in poisons calls<\/a><\/p>\n The ABC has analysed data from poisons hotlines across the country, revealing almost 1,500 calls were made about children taking melatonin last year, a dramatic rise on previous figures.\u00a0<\/p>\n Some online products, which are popular with parents as a sleep aid for children, had as much as four times the amount of melatonin advertised.<\/p>\n “We are continuing to monitor signals relating to harmful unregistered products and will notify the ABF to seize and destroy any counterfeit products intercepted at the border,” a TGA spokesperson said.<\/p>\n Royal Australian College of General Practitioners spokesman Tim Jones said while the border seizures might seem dramatic to some, imported products did not meet the TGA’s strict safety standards and posed additional risks.<\/p>\n These were the products found to have contained significantly more than the labelled amount, according to the TGA.\u00a0 (Supplied: TGA)<\/p>\n “There’s an increasing amount of research overseas into the quality of these products and that really set off some alarm bells \u2026 when we saw huge variability in the actual melatonin content,” Dr Jones said.<\/p>\n The symptoms of melatonin overdoses range from headaches and drowsiness to less common cases of nausea and vomiting, and Dr Jones said increased quantities of melatonin \u2014 whether taken intentionally or by accident \u2014 could heighten the risk of those side effects.<\/p>\n “As a doctor who sees a lot of children, I’m very much supportive of this idea that careful action is being taken to ensure that safety of things that we give to our children is paramount,” he said.<\/p>\n ‘Taking the piss’: Prescriptions cost 10 times more than online products<\/p>\n Perth public health professional Naomi Campbell-Smith has taken melatonin for about five years after her doctor prescribed it to help counteract the effects of ADHD medication.<\/p>\n “It just helps me go to sleep \u2014 it helps me fall asleep and stay asleep \u2014 which is kind of very important to functioning and existing as an adult in the workplace and in the world the day after,” she said.<\/p>\n Naomi Campbell-Smith was prescribed melatonin\u00a0to help counteract the effects of ADHD medication. (Supplied)<\/p>\n Generally, most Australians need a prescription to use melatonin, but many people circumvent the process by buying melatonin online from overseas retailers, because it is often significantly cheaper and can be bought without a script.<\/p>\n Ms Campbell-Smith has previously used prescriptions to get melatonin from the pharmacy and at one point was getting melatonin compounded by the chemist, but that is now only an option for medications that are not commercially available.<\/p>\n As a result, she said the pharmacy products now cost her anywhere from $300 to $480 for 90 tablets of 5mg melatonin, compared to $32 for 90 gummies online with the same amount of melatonin.<\/p>\n “I’ve always used it with a script. I’m very much a goody two shoes when it comes to this sort of thing,” she said.<\/p>\n “I didn’t opt to go online. The hand was sort of forced in that respect as there wasn’t really a viable alternative at the time.”<\/p>\n The symptoms of melatonin overdoses range from headaches and drowsiness to less common cases of nausea and vomiting. (ABC News: Patrick Stone)<\/p>\n The 33-year-old argued health authorities should focus more on making the sleep hormone easier to buy locally.<\/p>\n “This feels like, rather than the TGA supporting Australians to be able to access goods for their health and wellbeing, that they are simply blocking it at multiple turns for people to be able to access safe and affordable medication in Australia,” she said.<\/p>\n “Rather than addressing that affordability, they’re focusing only on safety, and you kind of have to do both.”<\/p>\n “If it still needs to be scripted, that’s fine\u2026 but $300 is taking the piss.”<\/p>\n What is melatonin?<\/p>\n Melatonin is a hormone that regulates the sleep-wake cycle and an increasing number of parents have turned to it to help their children sleep, sometimes in the form of flavoured gummies.<\/p>\n ABC News recently revealed Australian poisons hotlines received a record number of about 1,500 calls last year<\/a> about children ingesting melatonin, a dramatic spike on previous years.<\/p>\n Popular online retailer iHerb suspended melatonin sales to Australia <\/a>last August, after reports of a jump in calls to the WA Poisons Information Centre about children taking the sleep hormone.<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/a374afab1ac132ea3fb3cafc8ffc953a.jpeg\")
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